


Antiphon

by jessalae



Category: Devil Went Down to Georgia (Song)
Genre: Gen, Jukebox Fanworks Exchange
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-03
Updated: 2015-06-03
Packaged: 2018-04-02 18:06:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4069510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jessalae/pseuds/jessalae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Johnny said, "Devil, just come on back if you ever wanna try again,<br/>I done told you once—you son of a bitch—I'm the best that's ever been."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Antiphon

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sevenofspade](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevenofspade/gifts).



> **Antiphon** (musical term): a liturgical or other composition consisting of choral responses, sometimes between two choirs; a repeated passage in a psalm or other liturgical piece, similar to a refrain.

Byleth slinks into the office on Monday morning with an empty sample case and a hangdog expression. He sidles down the rows of cubicles, hoping all of his colleagues will be too absorbed in their latest cases to ask him how his trip to Georgia went. Monday mornings are always pretty busy -- humans getting back to their normal corruptible routines after a Sunday of righteousness -- so maybe, just maybe, none of the other devils will notice that he’s not going to make quota. Again.

Once he’s at his desk, the neat stacks of paperwork and little cups of office supplies are comforting. Byleth sighs and shuffles through his inbox, looking for a new likely target -- someone younger, maybe, or from a remote Siberian village with no exposure to fiddling. Or a tuba player! He’s quite good at tuba.

“Byleth,” says a serpentine voice from his cubicle opening.

Byleth tenses and turns slowly around in his chair, wincing at the horrific squeak it makes as it rotates. “Lamia.”

She taps her blood-red claws against the hard plastic edging of his cubicle. “I got a message from Acquisitions yesterday morning.”

“Oh?”

“This message didn’t make me happy.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Would you care to explain _why_ I had to have my breakfast interrupted by bad news?”

Byleth swallows hard. “A miscalculation, ma’am. Won’t happen again.”

“I believe that’s what you told me the last time. And the time before that.”

“Our algorithm seems to be a bit, ah, _off_ in the musician category. It’s usually good about finding humans with high confidence and lower ability, but I’ve had a string of targets whose ability is a match for their confidence.” Byleth waves a stack of manila folders for emphasis. “I can only work with what I’m given.”

Lamia stares at him with unblinking yellow eyes. “There’s only so long I can go on blaming Identifications for your incompetence, Byleth,” she says finally. “Shape up this quarter, or you’re answering to Downstairs.”

“Understood.”

Byleth waits until Lamia’s stiletto-sharp claws have click-click-clicked all the way around the corner, then buries his face in the folders and lets out a silent scream. He sits up, yanks Johnny’s file from his “In Progress” box, and sucks in a big breath, getting ready to destroy it in a satisfying gout of flame.

His resolve fizzles out when he sees Johnny’s smug face smiling at him from the picture paperclipped to the front of the folder. He’s so young, so self-satisfied, and his face is so eminently punchable -- he should have been a sure thing. Byleth doesn’t know how everything went so terribly wrong. It had to have been a fluke. He caught the kid on a randomly good day, maybe, or someone from the Upstairs Side decided to put a finger on the scale. Sheer dumb luck, that’s what it was.

Byleth sighs heavily, tiny jets of flame shooting out both nostrils, and puts Johnny’s file back in his In Progress box. Then he cracks his knuckles and dials the extension for Collateral to ask for another advance on golden fiddles. Nobody can get that lucky twice.

***

Johnny’s out on his back porch, rosining his bow, his fiddle sitting on his lap. Byleth appears in a puff of smoke and a brief roar of hellfire, scorching a circle in the scruffy lawn. Johnny looks in up, surprised, but not nearly as fearful as Byleth would like.

“Back already?” Johnny asks. “You know, that gold fiddle doesn’t play worth a damn. Metal doesn’t vibrate the same way as wood. I’m fixing to sell it for scrap metal at the jeweler’s.”

“Do with it what you will,” Byleth says in his best wheedle, laughing internally. Once Johnny’s soul is secured inside his sample case, he can just take the golden fiddle back down to Collateral where it belongs. He’ll never know what hit him.

Johnny stretches and puts down his rosin. “So, are you here with the same deal? My soul against your golden fiddle?”

“The very same,” Byleth croons. “Do you accept?”

Johnny plucks out shave-and-a-haircut on the strings of his fiddle, then smiles, smug and broad just like in his photo. “I accept. I just sure hope you know what you’re in for.”

Byleth stifles the urge to singe off his eyebrows, and instead whisks his fiddle out of its case. “As you say.”

He starts in on a tune he hasn’t used in a while, one that once got him a half-dozen souls in a weekend at a country music convention. It’s full of harsh staccato and counterpoint legato, sounds that confuse the ear and leave the mind feeling a bit seasick, but somehow hungry for more. The notes spiral up the scale in cascading patterns, seeming to pull the air in the room up with them, a cyclone of sound. The song ends on a series of quick high notes like lightening, and a long slide down to the ground. Byleth lowers his bow triumphantly and smiles silently, closed-mouthed, at Johnny.

“Haven’t heard anything like that before,” Johnny says, scratching a mosquito bite. “Not a bad try.”

Byleth doesn’t say anything -- he knows desperate bravado when he sees it. Johnny shrugs and picks up his bow again.

“S’pose I should make good on my part of the deal,” he says, and starts to play.

Johnny’s notes cascade too, up and up and then down again, like white-water rapids that spike your adrenaline and refresh you with icy spray. His melody spirals like a gyroscope, rhythm swinging back and forth between gorgeous sustained notes and abrupt, exciting interludes. He plays out of a minor key and into a major one, the sun coming up on a new morning when everything is fresh with dew, and turns the piece into a song of triumph, a gloating told-you-so. He finishes right when the song is hitting its highest peak, and ends quietly, a peaceful wrap-up. As the last notes fade from the evening sky, he puts down his fiddle and goes back to calmly rosining his bow.

Byleth’s teeth are gritted so hard he’s afraid they might break, but he doesn’t say anything. He can’t trust himself to speak right now. He leaves the golden fiddle on the porch step, turns on his heel, and disappears in another plume of smoke and hellfire, feeling sick to his stomach.

***

On Tuesday, Byleth calls in sick.

On Wednesday, he walks into work with determination in his stride and heads straight for his cubicle. He flips through his rolodex until he finds what he’s looking for, then picks up his fiddle and marches back out to the elevator that goes all the way Downstairs.

He finds Nero in the Eighth Circle, right where he expected him, wiping off the morning’s layer of boiling pitch and looking thoroughly disgruntled.

“Can I help you?” the emperor asks without looking at Byleth.

“I was wondering if you’re in the business of giving music lessons,” Byleth asks.

Nero makes a face. “Will that damned rumor never die?” he says. “I wasn’t even in town at the time of the fire. I paid for the relief effort out of my own treasury, for Jupiter’s sake! But no, build one gods-blighted palace on land that just _happened_ to be cleared out in the blaze, and you’re forever plagued with radicals, historians, psychotic admirers, and all manner of riffraff--”

“I can get Malacoda to give you a rest this afternoon.”

Nero swivels in his seat. “How long of a rest?”

“Ten minutes?”

“Sold.” Nero eyes Byleth’s fiddle case suspiciously, then sighs. “You realize I play the lyre, yes, not one of those newfangled contraptions?”

“The principle is the same,” Byleth says, busily rosining his bow. “I just need a few pointers.”

They spend the morning working on plucking, bowing, and finger positions until Byleth’s fingertips are raw. He returns to his desk whistling in the odd enharmonic scale that Nero favors, and starts to put together his paperwork for another trip topside.

***

Johnny’s in his bedroom playing Guitar Hero, and he grins that smug grin when he turns around to see Byleth leaning against his closet door, foul-smelling black smoke swirling around his feet. “Back for more? The big man down below must really want my soul.”

“You’ve had a good run,” Byleth says breezily, “But nobody’s luck lasts forever.” 

“Luck? Pfft.” Johnny sets his controller down and rummages under his bed for his fiddle case. “This is pure natural talent, man. But hey, I haven’t sent those other two fiddles to Cash4Gold yet, so I might as well pick up a third.”

“Then we have a deal?”

“Sure do.”

“Excellent,” Byleth says, grinning as smugly as Johnny (although with slightly pointier teeth). He whisks out his fiddle, tuned in Nero’s preferred scale, and rolls out a tune that would set Rome on fire a hundred miles away. The notes trip and babble over each other, creating harmonies and points of discord that entice the ear and ensnare the mind, set toes tapping and hearts racing, and have the windows of Johnny’s room rattling in their frames. The song ends with a powerful six-note screech, and Byleth lets it hang in the air for a few seconds before he sets down his fiddle and raises a single eyebrow at Johnny.

Johnny nods slowly. “That’s a different sound for you. I like it.”

“...and you can’t do any better?” Byleth prompts hopefully.

“Oh, no, I can do better,” Johnny says. “I just thought I’d give credit where credit is due.”

Byleth sputters, but before he can say anything, Johnny has his fiddle out and is coaxing out a 100-mile-an-hour run that leads into a breathtaking series of notes and intervals, each more frantic and more beautiful than the last. Byleth tries not to let his jaw hang open, and realizes that, infuriatingly, Johnny’s tune is the perfect counterpoint to his own, a harmony that would set the room ablaze if the songs were played together -- and after only hearing the damn thing once. He sets his jaw and tries not to shake with anger. When Johnny takes his tune all the way up into the upper reaches of the fiddle’s range, then down in a cascade like a waterfall, Byleth slumps forward, knowing there’s no way he’s getting out of this with his dignity. He leaves the golden fiddle on the floor and steps backwards through the closet as Johnny plays one last flourish, and the kid’s laughter echoes after him all the way home.

***

THWACK! The stapler bites right between Johnny’s eyes, and when Byleth takes it away, the photo is securely fastened to the wall of his cubicle. He stares at the photo, feeling the rage grow in his chest, then eyes the growing pile of paperwork in his Inbox and decides to move part of it to the floor. It’s too hard to play when he’s distracted by the prospect by of a file avalanche.

“Byleth.” The serpentine voice is surprisingly gentle today. “A word.”

“My apologies, Lamia, but can it wait? I’m right in the middle of something.” Byleth plucks a string on his fiddle and listens for any imperfections, any impurities, in its sound. Maybe if he switch to catgut strings? Made of the actual guts of actual cats? That might give him the evil edge his sound needs.

“This level of obsession is unprofessional, Byleth,” Lamia says. “I recognize that it can be difficult to let go of failed cases, but you need to stop pursuing this one. I spoke with Identifications, and they have a new batch of profiles all ready to go.” She offers him a fat manila envelope. “There’s still time to make quota.”

Byleth takes the envelope without looking at it and sets in on the floor with the other files. “Thanks, good. I’ll get to those right after I’ve finished with this one.”

Lamia’s shadow swells to five times her size, reaching all the way up to the ceiling and filling Byleth’s cubicle with writhing tendrils of darkness. “I need you to drop that case and move on to new files, Byleth.”

Byleth sighs. “All right, Lamia.” He picks up the envelope of cases and pulls one out at random. “I’ll get to it.”

“Excellent.” Lamia’s shadow shrinks back to normal, and she nods once before heading for the break room.

Byleth glances over the file. Fourteen years old, violin prodigy, auditioning for the National Symphony Orchestra in a week? Piece of cake. And after he’s done in Virginia, it’ll be just as easy to pop down to Georgia for a visit…

***

Byleth’s sample case is pleasantly heavy as it bounces over the gravel path behind him, the violin prodigy’s soul making tiny muffled wailing noises that only infernal hearing can detect. Byleth checks the address he scribbled on the back of a napkin and walks casually towards the refurbished barn. The sun has set and the crickets are singing, and the strings of lights draped over the doors and along the path twinkle cheerfully in the evening dark. Inside the building, a deep voice is talking, with smatterings of laughter every few sentences.

Byleth stashes his sample case in a bush and double-checks the tuning on his fiddle. It had sounded just fine earlier in the evening, but nothing less than absolute perfection will do for this case. He finally gets his C-string set where he wants it, and sidles carefully into the barn, mentally prodding a couple of catering staff to move out of his way and then forget he was ever there so he can find a good spot in the corner.

The speech-maker finishes, “And now, give it up for Johnny Brown, who will be playing an original composition for Taylor and Monique’s first dance!”

Johnny materializes on the dais, fiddle raised, and waits for the couple to make their way onto the dance floor. Then he smiles at them, taps a one-two-three with his foot, and sets bow to strings, and Byleth’s heart sinks. The waltz he plays is simple, easy enough for two inexperienced dancers to follow along with, but so heartbreakingly sweet and beautiful that Byleth’s stomach aches. The notes paint a picture in the air of longing, of childhood sweethearts, of partings and endings and second tries, of finally coming home to someone who fits with you like a missing puzzle piece. The melody is hope and love and prayer and thankfulness all rolled into one. Byleth catches himself with tears in his eyes and blinks furiously, growling under his breath.

Somehow, as if he can hear Byleth’s frustration, Johnny chooses that moment to look out over the crowd. And somehow, even though Byleth is hiding under a discreet layer of passive mind control, he looks right at him. And he _smiles_.

Byleth trudges back out of the barn, collects his sample case, and heads home.

***

A week later, Byleth’s cubicle looks like a tornado touched down inside it. Files are scattered everywhere; the little cups of paper clips and rubber bands are upside-down, their contents littering the floor beneath his chair; his word-of-the-day desk calendar hasn’t been torn off in a week.

“This is unlike you, Byleth,” Lamia says, lifting up one foot to grimace at the four sheets of paperwork that her claws have pierced. “I’m beginning to be concerned about your welfare. Have you considered speaking with someone from the Infernal Wellness Program?”

“I’m just fine,” Byleth says blankly. He signs a paper with a flourish, spattering blood from the end of his pen across the surface of his desk, and hands it to Lamia without looking at her. “My quarterly report.”

Lamia looks it over, frowning. “Eleven souls last week? That would be a productivity increase of--”

“Two in Santa Fe, one in Detroit, four from the greater Chicago area, and five from various parts of Texas when I went over there to cover while Amducias was out sick,” Byleth rattles off. “Check with Acquisitions, they’ll confirm.”

“I’m sure.” Lamia scratches at her scales absent-mindedly, poring over the report. “Well, Byleth, this puts you in the running for top performer in our department. I have to congratulate you, though like I said, I continue to be concerned.”

“Do top performers get priority on vacation approval?” Byleth asks casually.

“Well, not as a rule…”

“I’ve been thinking of visiting my sister over in Los Angeles,” he continues. “She’s with the Talent Deal department over there, but they’re closing her office for a few days to repaint, so she has some time. She’s been offering to show me around town for ages. Personally I think she just wants to walk me by a few sets and show off her handiwork, but I wouldn’t mind a change of scenery, and I hear good things about the taco trucks--”

“Yes,” Lamia says sharply, holding up a hand to cut him off. “Yes, that’s wonderful, I do think a vacation could do you some good. Make it a four-day weekend.”

“Thanks,” Byleth says, and turns back to his desk. “I could do with a rest.”

***

“It’s been a while,” Johnny says when Byleth appears in front of him. He’s lounging on his back porch, watching the sun set and picking out a pared-down rendition of Carmina Burana on the strings of his fiddle. “I was starting to think you weren’t gonna come back.”

“I’m not one to give up,” Byleth says, his smile stretching slightly too wide. “Had a little time to spare, so I thought I’d drop by.”

“Had a solid gold fiddle to spare, too?” Johnny asks, nodding at the case in Byleth’s hand.

Byleth’s eye twitches. “I know where to find these kinds of things.” Unguarded storerooms, for example. If he can get back with Johnny’s soul before Monday, nobody will ever have to be the wiser.

“Hm.” Johnny sits up and cracks his knuckles. “Well, should we get this show on the road?”

“Your soul against this fiddle,” Byleth says, just to make it official. “I play, then you play. Whoever’s better takes his prize.”

“Deal,” Johnny says, and grins that grin that makes Byleth want to burn him alive and bottle him up at the same time.

Byleth clears his throat and gets out his fiddle, newly strung, carefully tuned, varnished to perfection, as beautiful an instrument as you’d ever find. He closes his eyes and reaches down deep, and when he starts to play it’s like the music is coming straight out of the spot where his soul would be, shooting up like a seedling shoots through dirt to seek the sun. The notes come hard and fast, not loud but intense, and each one has a precise place in the song, locking together like particles of stone in a marble statue.

And then, in the middle of the song, there are other notes, like a vein of diamond running through the marble, coloring it and making it shine. Byleth’s eyes snap open and he looks up to see Johnny staring at him intently, adding harmonies and counterpoints to the song.

“What are you doing?” he hisses.

“Just trying something,” Johnny says, shrugging. “Go on, keep going.”

Byleth shouldn’t be taking orders from this upstart kid, but he picks the song up where he left it off, crescendoing through a key change, and there’s the counterpoint again, bringing the notes into discord and resolving them into harmony in a way that makes something sigh with relief deep in Byleth’s heart. The music is brilliant, shining, and as the fiddlers pick up the pace the frogs stop calling, the wind stops blowing, every living and unliving thing on earth stops to listen to the song. The sound echoes farther than it naturally could, carried through the air on overtones and whispers, and Byleth finds the hair on the back of his neck standing on end, goosebumps on his skin. He decrescendos down into the end of the song, letting his bow barely whisper across the strings, and Johnny plays a final run and trill that runs in contrast to his slow notes until they meld together in the ending chord.

The sound hangs in the air for a long, long moment, until Johnny says, “Wow.”

“Wow,” Byleth repeats, feeling dazed.

“That was better’n me,” Johnny says.

Byleth frowns. “But you were in on it.”

“It was better than me alone,” Johnny says. “I’m not saying you won -- but I’m not going to beat that by myself. No way.”

Byleth nods slowly. “So I guess that puts us at a draw, then.” 

“I guess.”

Byleth shakes his head to clear it and starts to put up his fiddle. “I won’t be back,” he says, not looking at Johnny. “I know when I’ve been beaten. It’s been… a pleasure, hearing you play.”

Johnny scratches his chin. “You know, those golden fiddles got me a nice chunk of change.”

“Oh?” Byleth says, bristling a little.

“I’ve been thinking about using the cash to set myself up as a musician. Go on tour, meet with some agents, maybe put out an EP. Get a song on the radio.” Johnny pauses. “I could use some backup, though.”

“Oh?” Byleth says again, not moving.

“Another fiddle, maybe someone who could come in on guitar or vocals, or horns. Don’t want to make it too big an operation, though. I like to travel light. What d’you say?”

Byleth looks up, and Johnny is smiling at him, that hellfire-damned smile that’s driven him to these depths -- a smile that says “I’ll make a bet with the devil four times over, and make good on it every time” -- a smile that says, “There’s something here we can work with.”

Byleth takes out his bow again. “Let’s see what we can do.”

**Author's Note:**

> I loved your prompt for this song, sevenofspade! This was lots of fun to write, and I hope you enjoy it. :)


End file.
